I have pigged out so bad today. I realize on one hand that food has become my biggest comfort, over everything, yet, at the very same time, being in this fat body is the biggest discomfort I've ever endured, by far !
How can food be a comfort, if it directly makes me uncomfortable? I ponder this.

Your trading one for the other; feel good with food, or feel good in body.


Foods my favourite choice still, unfortunately. I ate good all day and came home and had chips. My stomach feels icky and I wanna eat more, haha.

For me, food is an addiction, it doesn't comfort me, it medicates me so I don't feel for awhile. But with most drugs, the medicating power doesn't last....and I crash after it's over. It's a filler. It fills the void, so I don't feel...but like a lake with a weak damn, it doesn't stay full...so I have to keep adding and adding. You hear it all the time, and a lot of people totally disagree that some foods, (sugar and carbs mostly reported) have an addiction potential, but like an alcoholic feels MARVELOUS as they chug down their Whiskey, the payoff is a massive hangover. Food hangovers, alcohol hangovers, narcotic hangovers. Food isn't comfort, it's your drug of choice.

How can food be a comfort, if it directly makes me uncomfortable?

Emotional eating.

Because food can have pleasant memories attached to it, pleasant mouth-feel, it is one of the few things people do for themselves in the area of "self-nurture" since we all need to eat, etc. When eating the item, they feel better because of the associations. Some bump up seratonin or give you a blood sugar boost so you feel more "up" -- temporarily.

But the food comes with calories attached, and how we process the food can add to weight gain. We cannot eat away uncomfortable emotions even though we may try to "stuff down" sadness, pain, anger, loneliness, etc.

If you are working on this, I suggest "Life is Hard, Food is Easy" by Linda Spangle.

GL!
A.

What Lori Bell said.

Food is a drug for me, as well. It offers momentary bliss. While chewing & tasting I'm in a state of not-being, wholly concentrated on the physical sensation I'm experiencing. I'm out of this world, almost.

But the feeling is very brief. So I keep eating, trying to get back some of the thrill of that first good taste. Sometimes, even when it's no longer all that pleasurable & I am just mechanically putting one thing after another into my mouth. Yeah, another hit will finally do it ...

And as with any drug, there's the withdrawal & the remorse, the self-recrimination. (Why? Why do you do this to yourself?)

Which can lead to the cycle of eating more, to get away from those uncomfortable feelings.

Pondering it hasn't helped me, except in being able to better describe it here online to others, or to a therapist. Pondering just led me in circles of inactive contemplation.

Snapping out of the haze & asking myself some pointed questions did help, Like:

- What am I feeling?
- Is my very specific craving actually my mind's attempt at distracting me from what I am really feeling?
- Is food really going to solve that problem that I'm so assiduously avoiding confronting?
- Is food really going to make me feel better for more than a few minutes?
- What actually WOULD solve the problem? Usually, it is an action, and it's not eating.
- How can I make myself feel better without eating?

Pondering those things & acting on them helps me.